I am currently reading Cults Inside Out and am about a third of the way through and am very happy with this book . It is really one of the very best on cults in my opinion. I plan to write a review when I finish it .
I felt a list of cult characteristics within is quite good and from my twenty five years in Scientology and year out spending hundreds of hours searching for the cult and Ron Hubbard's true history has thoroughly convinced me the Scientology cult definitely has all of the characteristics of a cult . I invite everyone to look at them and give your own opinion on if Scientology demonstated them or not . And to what degree . You are free to give details or personal impressions to bring out ideas on your views . We all had a unique experience in some ways but I think we may agree on some aspects of it .
1)The leadership of the group has absolute authority without any meaningful accountability.
2) There is no genuine democratic form of governance that would offer any meaningful checks or balances to the power of the leadership through elections, a constitution, or bylaws.
3)There is no meaningful financial disclosure or transparency regarding the group’s money or assets.
4) There is no detailed and independently audited financial statement or budget published or distributed to the members or contributors annually, disclosing in detail all salaries, compensation, and expenses paid out from group funds.
5)Only the leadership and its chosen few really know about the finances of the group in any depth.
6) Leaders define what is right and wrong, and group members are expected to essentially defer any meaningful value judgments of their own.
7) A kind of learned dependence often develops regarding problem solving and conflict resolution.
8) There is notable and extreme hyperactivity in the group, which is completely centered on the agenda of the leadership, with little, if any, meaningful consideration for the goals of individual members or their interests.
9)The group deliberately isolates its members in a substantially controlled environment.
10) Information is controlled by creating strict rules or guidelines regarding such things as books, outside reading, television, movies, radio, and music.
11)Members may be prohibited contact with anyone who might express independent or opposing ideas, doubts, or negative feelings about the group.
12)The group and its leaders are seen as absolutely necessary to filter out the contamination of the outside world. There are no meaningful boundaries.
13)There is no area of a member’s life that appears to be private and therefore immune from the leadership’s scrutiny.
14)The group promotes unreasonable fears about the outside world. This may be expressed through predictions of impending catastrophe, obsessions about evil conspiracies, or seemingly exaggerated claims and paranoid suspicions about the group’s perceived enemies.
15) The group perpetuates an ethos of perfectionism.
16)Members subsequently feel that they can never be “good enough”and are forever striving to further prove themselves.
17) The group devalues self-esteem and individual expression and considers them “selfish.”
18) Group members who try to question leadership or express ideas outside the group mind-set are characterized negatively with such labels as “ego driven,”“rebellious,”“suppressive,”“demonic,”or “satanic.”
19) Former members once associated with the group often relate the same allegations of abuse by the leadership. This repetition reflects a continuing pattern of grievances.
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